Jonathan Martin/NY Times:
Despite Big House Losses, G.O.P. Shows No Signs of Course Correction
With a brutal finality, the extent of the Republicans’ collapse in the House came into focus last week as more races slipped away from them and their losses neared 40 seats.
Yet nearly a month after the election, there has been little self-examination among Republicans about why a midterm that had seemed at least competitive became a rout.
President Trump has brushed aside questions about the loss of the chamber entirely, ridiculing losing incumbents by name, while continuing to demand Congress fund a border wall despite his party losing many of their most diverse districts. Unlike their Democratic counterparts, Republicans swiftly elevated their existing slate of leaders with little debate, signaling a continuation of their existing political strategy.
And neither Speaker Paul D. Ryan nor Representative Kevin McCarthy, the incoming minority leader, have stepped forward to confront why the party’s once-loyal base of suburban supporters abandoned it — and what can be done to win them back.
Fine. We’ll take them.
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Looks like a wave to me. A big one.
Sean Sullivan/WaPo:
The last stand of Congress’s Never Trump brigade
Some of President Trump’s loudest Republican critics are asserting themselves during their final weeks in Congress, as the GOP prepares to usher in a class of lawmakers poised to show stronger support for the White House.
One defiant Republican is seeking to protect the special counsel investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, another wants to toughen U.S. policy toward Saudi Arabia, and a third is warning that embracing Trump is perilous for the future of the Republican Party.
The moves amount to a last gasp from a wing of the GOP that has been unable steer the party away from Trump during the first two years of his presidency and will see its ranks diminished in the next Congress. The shifting dynamic reflects Trump’s dominance in the party and the marginalization of dissenting voices, even after a disappointing midterm election for Republicans in which Democrats won back the House.
They will go down with him, but down they will go.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump is doing his best to make John McCain and George HW Bush beloved. He can’t help himself, it’s who he is.
Max Boot/WaPo:
George H.W. Bush, the anti-Trump
It is hard to imagine two men more disparate in character than the 41st and 45th presidents of the United States. George H.W. Bush and Donald J. Trump had almost nothing in common beyond their privileged upbringing and membership in the Republican Party.
During World War II, Bush volunteered for the Navy at age 18 and two years later was shot down over the Pacific. Trump won five draft deferments to avoid the Vietnam War. Bush held a long series of appointed and elective government positions before becoming president, making him one of the most knowledgeable occupants of the Oval Office. Trump had no government experience and still has next-to-no knowledge of policy. Bush was so self-effacing that he hated to use the personal pronoun — “don’t be talking about yourself,” his mother instructed him. Trump, by contrast, hardly talks about anything other than himself.
So how, in the space of a quarter-century, did we go from President Bush to President Trump? Part of the answer may be found in the Bush years, where, with the advantage of hindsight, one can already see the gathering storm that Trump would unleash on the country.
David Greenberg/Politico:
Is History Being Too Kind to George H.W. Bush?
The 41st president put self-interest over principle time and time again.
But when it comes to presidents and historical actors of consequence, we also need critical dissent. When writing my first book, Nixon’s Shadow, about that president’s endlessly protean image, I found myself grateful that at the time of his funeral—a whitewash that minimized his constitutional crimes—sober, serious historians like David Halberstamand Garry Wills stood up to provide corrective reminders. Had they not done so, future readers might have believed that Nixon’s attempted comeback had succeeded when in fact it did not. Respect for the dead must coexist with respect for the historical record.
Sarah Jones/NY Magazine:
North Carolina Race Roiled by Claims of Voter Fraud — But Not the Kind the GOP Worries About
Just for fun, here’s another way to commit voter fraud in North Carolina. You could — theoretically, of course — hire someone who would coordinate an effort to falsify absentee ballots. That’s the allegation roiling the state’s Ninth Congressional District, where Republican Mark Harris defeated his Democratic challenger, Dan McCready, by just 905 votes. For all the GOP’s hand-wringing over voter fraud in North Carolina, one of their own candidates has been caught up in a scandal over voting irregularities.
Sworn affidavits submitted by Bladen County voters paint a bizarre picture. The Washington Post reports that in one affidavit, a voter, Datesha Montgomery, said that a woman came to her home in October, explaining she was collecting ballots in the area. But Montgomery hadn’t completed her ballot. “I filled out two names on the ballot, Hakeem Brown for Sheriff and Vince Rozier for board of education,” Montgomery wrote. “She stated the others were not important. I gave her the ballot and she said she would finish it herself. I signed the ballot and she left. It was not sealed up at any time.” Another affidavit claimed that a Bladen County man named Leslie McCrae Dowless had acknowledged “doing absentee” for the Harris campaign and said that he would receive $40,000 if Harris won. “You know I don’t take checks. They have to pay me cash,” the affidavit quotes Dowless as saying.
Why do they lie? Hmmmmm…...
Jim Morrill/Charlotte Observer:
‘Tangled web’ in Bladen County has questions swirling about votes in the 9th District
In a letter to the chairman of the state elections board, Democratic Party attorney John Wallace urged the board to delay certification beyond Friday’s scheduled meeting.
“After pulling the fire alarm on Tuesday, the State Board cannot in good conscience certify the election three days later, when so much smoke continues to hang over this election,” he wrote.
Wallace went on to say a review of public records “confirms that serious irregularities and improprieties may have occurred.” Bladen County had the highest percentage of absentee ballot requests in the state. There, 7.5 percent of registered voters requested absentee ballots. In most counties it was less than 3 percent.
An analysis by Catawba College political scientist Michael Bitzer suggested more aberrations.
In seven of the eight counties in the 9th District, for example, McCready won a lopsided majority of the mailed-in absentee ballots. But not in Bladen County. There, Republican Mark Harris won 61 percent even though registered Republicans accounted for only 19 percent of the county’s accepted absentee ballots.
Unaffiliated voters accounted for 39 percent. Bitzer said Harris’ margin “could potentially come from all those unaffiliated voters.”
“But to have each and every one of those unaffiliated voters vote Republican, that’s pretty astonishing,” he added. “If that’s the case, there’s a very concerted effort to use that method to one candidate’s advantage. . . . But at that level there’s something else beyond a concerted effort that could be at work.”
Paul Kane/WaPo:
Triumphant Democrats offer a primer on how to beat Trump in Pennsylvania
These results will make Pennsylvania, and its 20 electoral votes, the top target for the Democratic presidential nominee in 2020.
Michigan, with 16 electoral votes, also saw a sharp swing away from Republicans. Democrats there won governor and Senate races by comfortable margins, though not quite as big as in Pennsylvania, while picking up a few House seats.
If the Democratic nominee wins those two states, Trump’s electoral total would drop to 270 based on states he won in 2016.
That would leave him not one electoral vote to spare as Democrats would also fight to win back Florida, Wisconsin, Iowa, North Carolina and possibly Ohio. At this point, Minnesota appears to be Trump’s only new offensive target for 2020.
Bloomberg:
How Trump’s Tax Returns Could Become Public
How might Trump be forced to release his returns?
Congressman Richard Neal, a Massachusetts Democrat, will rise to chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee when the next Congress convenes on Jan. 3. As chairman, he can use a 1924 law to ask the U.S. Treasury secretary for the returns of any taxpayer -- including the president. (The Republicans who have controlled Congress thus far during the Trump presidency had this same power but showed no interest in using it.) Neal has said he plans to make this request, pending discussions with his aides on the legal procedures to do so. With the returns in hand, the committee could then vote to release them -- or a summary of their findings -- to all 435 members of the House. That would effectively make the information contained in the returns, if not the returns themselves, public.
Apologies to Benny Hill.